Monday, August 4, 2014

Otso Otso O!

Which is the name of a Filipino song that was very popular while I was on my mission. Watch at your own risk! I always thought that dance, which you can see when it hits the chorus, was a little odd and it was even more so when 5 year old kids were doing it in the streets. Otso = ocho = eight which is number of years we've been married!

John was at scout camp on our actual anniversary. Then he got sick and then I got sick and other obligations kept popping up. So finally, 3 weeks later we went out to celebrate.

Matterhorn food truck French toast and reading in a shady spot in the grass by a favorite pond made up our morning. In the afternoon we packed a picnic and headed down to Utah Lake to canoe. This fulfilled so many of my weird bayou, Jungle Cruise, Tom Sawyer fantasies that I was in pure heaven even if I wasn't a very helpful rower. There were a few loud groups of dating twenty-somethings, but we steered clear of them and were able to see some wildlife: muskrat, weasel, and a turtle.

Having an hour or so to spare before dinner at Communal, John gave me a grand tour of his various apartments from his college days including the old part of King Henry, the School House, the Mine Shaft, the darn Amarilla, Southridge, and someplace on condo row. Some were ghetto and I'm pretty proud of him for being so frugal when he was younger, but some of those places were scarily rundown.

Can't you imagine alligators, hippos, and manatees lurking beneath the surface? Or Amazon dolphins? I'm such a nerd. Jungle Cruise really was one of my favorite rides as a kid and for awhile I thought those mechanical animals in the water were real.

The School House. They tore down Joaquin Elementary and the field next to it and replaced it with a behemoth of an apartment complex complete with mini shopping center.

The Mineshaft, whose entrance is the lower door with the couches on the roof.

We busted out the tripod on Center Street so we could finally get a picture of the two of us together. You'll notice that I just brought a skirt to throw on after canoeing. I don't know if the results were so great.